i cry at their bowl
I was studying Contracts at Heather's house when I got an e-mail from Mary asking how I would feel about having cats when we got an apartment together. She and her parents found kittens that were living nearby. Two boys and a girl. Mary's parents would keep the girl; we'd get the two boys. Mary named Ed Green immediately after her favorite Law & Order detective. The other one, as kind of a favor to me, she decided to name Aragorn. (I always wanted a dog named Aragorn. Actually, I always wanted a first born son named Aragorn, but I didn't think I could ever get my husband to agree to that. Er, and by "always" I mean "since I first saw that scene in The Two Towers where Aragorn pushes the door open" . . . I digress.)
Mary and I moved in July 1 - the cats stayed at home in Pennsylvania with her parents while we waited for them to be old enough or big enough to get declawed. It was August before a trip to the vet revealed that "Aragorn" was actually a girl and Winnie (short for "Eowyn", the cat that stayed with Mary's parents) was actually a boy. (Believe it or not, it wasn't the first time that Mary's family misdiagnosed boy cats as girls and vice versa. But again, I digress) Aragorn became Sydney Bristow. They grew up, they got declawed, and on October 1, 2006, they moved in.
Those cats HATED me when they moved in. Or maybe they were just terrified and hated everyone. I remember what a breakthrough it was when Mary was out late with work friends one night and I was watching TV in the living room and they both came out from under her bed to sit with me. Of course any of the goodwill that I built with them that night was destroyed when Ed Green nearly choked to death on his collar and I had to pull him by his legs out from under the couch and cut it off of him.
It didn't take long though before they became my life. I'll never forget the first time Sydney managed to pry a closed door open. The time we locked Ed Green in the bathroom accidentally. The first time Ed Green let out a "big boy meow". The first time I saw them stick their paws underneath my door. The first time I caught them sleeping curled up together in Mary's laundry basket. The time I spent 20 minutes trying to get Ed Green out from under my bed before I left, only for Mary to text me an hour later to tell me she'd just found Sydney and she'd somehow managed to run in my room while I was pulling Ed Green out. The time Ed Green dragged Mary's bra off of the drying rack and into the kitchen. The time I caught Sydney on the stairs and I started spraying her with the spray bottle and she just rolled over onto her back and let me spray her. How much they loved their cow and their fish (and they even always knew to put the fish near their food dish - brilliant cats) and their mice and their wombat and their Uncle Pat (even though he stopped visiting after a few months and broke Ed Green's heart and then they snubbed him when he finally came by again like a year later) and their yarn. How Sydney seemed to have an internal clock that told her when whatever Mary and I were watching in the living room had five minutes left because that's when she would come into the room to join us. How much Sydney loved watching Eric Lane on C-Span. How they'd spy on Sergio's summer BBQs. How they were such good sports when I put Halloween costumes on them and how Sydney let me put a (whorish) dress on her when Uncle Briton came to visit. How they loved having their bellies rubbed and how Sydney let me carry her around like a baby. How loudly Sydney purred. How they were always there for me, always, and how they just seemed to know when I was sad or upset (and there were a lot of those moments while they lived here) and it was then that they'd be the most loving.
Last week, I was walking home from doing my laundry when I saw a cat who looked just like Sydney walking up the block. I knew it couldn't possibly be her, but I dropped my clothing off inside and ran up the street anyway, chasing it, scared that I'd somehow let her out, making a complete idiot of myself. I don't know what I would have done if I'd lost her.
Now they're both gone. And they're not coming back. And the next time I see them, which won't be for months at the very earliest and might end up totaling once every year or two, they won't even remember who I am. And it's pathetic that it's 2am and they've been gone for less than twelve hours, out of the rest of their lives without me, and that I'm sitting here thinking about how I'll never hear them cry outside my door again and that it's upsetting me more than any of the other shit I've dealt with in the past couple of months.
I'm not a crazy cat lady. I'm not even a cat person. But they were my cats and I loved them and I just miss them.
the first picture I took of them
I loved her little collar
it doesn't get more precious than this
And because I'm depressed and because this is the first thing I think of when I think of love for pets, I'll share the saddest minute in the history of cartoons.
"I had Seymour 'til he was three. That's when I knew him and that's when I loved him. I'll never forget him. But he forgot me a long long time ago."
Mary and I moved in July 1 - the cats stayed at home in Pennsylvania with her parents while we waited for them to be old enough or big enough to get declawed. It was August before a trip to the vet revealed that "Aragorn" was actually a girl and Winnie (short for "Eowyn", the cat that stayed with Mary's parents) was actually a boy. (Believe it or not, it wasn't the first time that Mary's family misdiagnosed boy cats as girls and vice versa. But again, I digress) Aragorn became Sydney Bristow. They grew up, they got declawed, and on October 1, 2006, they moved in.
Those cats HATED me when they moved in. Or maybe they were just terrified and hated everyone. I remember what a breakthrough it was when Mary was out late with work friends one night and I was watching TV in the living room and they both came out from under her bed to sit with me. Of course any of the goodwill that I built with them that night was destroyed when Ed Green nearly choked to death on his collar and I had to pull him by his legs out from under the couch and cut it off of him.
It didn't take long though before they became my life. I'll never forget the first time Sydney managed to pry a closed door open. The time we locked Ed Green in the bathroom accidentally. The first time Ed Green let out a "big boy meow". The first time I saw them stick their paws underneath my door. The first time I caught them sleeping curled up together in Mary's laundry basket. The time I spent 20 minutes trying to get Ed Green out from under my bed before I left, only for Mary to text me an hour later to tell me she'd just found Sydney and she'd somehow managed to run in my room while I was pulling Ed Green out. The time Ed Green dragged Mary's bra off of the drying rack and into the kitchen. The time I caught Sydney on the stairs and I started spraying her with the spray bottle and she just rolled over onto her back and let me spray her. How much they loved their cow and their fish (and they even always knew to put the fish near their food dish - brilliant cats) and their mice and their wombat and their Uncle Pat (even though he stopped visiting after a few months and broke Ed Green's heart and then they snubbed him when he finally came by again like a year later) and their yarn. How Sydney seemed to have an internal clock that told her when whatever Mary and I were watching in the living room had five minutes left because that's when she would come into the room to join us. How much Sydney loved watching Eric Lane on C-Span. How they'd spy on Sergio's summer BBQs. How they were such good sports when I put Halloween costumes on them and how Sydney let me put a (whorish) dress on her when Uncle Briton came to visit. How they loved having their bellies rubbed and how Sydney let me carry her around like a baby. How loudly Sydney purred. How they were always there for me, always, and how they just seemed to know when I was sad or upset (and there were a lot of those moments while they lived here) and it was then that they'd be the most loving.
Last week, I was walking home from doing my laundry when I saw a cat who looked just like Sydney walking up the block. I knew it couldn't possibly be her, but I dropped my clothing off inside and ran up the street anyway, chasing it, scared that I'd somehow let her out, making a complete idiot of myself. I don't know what I would have done if I'd lost her.
Now they're both gone. And they're not coming back. And the next time I see them, which won't be for months at the very earliest and might end up totaling once every year or two, they won't even remember who I am. And it's pathetic that it's 2am and they've been gone for less than twelve hours, out of the rest of their lives without me, and that I'm sitting here thinking about how I'll never hear them cry outside my door again and that it's upsetting me more than any of the other shit I've dealt with in the past couple of months.
I'm not a crazy cat lady. I'm not even a cat person. But they were my cats and I loved them and I just miss them.
the first picture I took of them
I loved her little collar
it doesn't get more precious than this
And because I'm depressed and because this is the first thing I think of when I think of love for pets, I'll share the saddest minute in the history of cartoons.
"I had Seymour 'til he was three. That's when I knew him and that's when I loved him. I'll never forget him. But he forgot me a long long time ago."
posted by Kerri @ 9:12 PM
1 Comments:
At May 10, 2008 at 10:25 PM ,
Becky said...
I'm sorry I don't have more Ed Green and Sydney moments to comemmorate this occasion with, but I would like to say yeahhh Eric Lane on C-Span!! Sydney obviously had very good taste!
Have you sent him the picture yet? Perhaps it would be soothing to your sad, cat-missing heart to share Sydney with the greatest law professor alive...just an idea.
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